


Rose Petals

by believeinmycroft



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Bisexuality, Crack, Fluff, Humor, International Fanworks Day 2016, M/M, One Shot, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Some feels, Sorry Not Sorry, Yaoi, a little bit of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-20 19:31:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6022177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/believeinmycroft/pseuds/believeinmycroft
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The thing is, Steve can understand why Bucky might want to read comic books - after all, who wouldn't want to read a story they're actually in? Even Bucky reading Japanese comics - "manga", apparently - isn't that unusual, if a little harder for Steve to wrap his head around. </p><p>But the last thing Steve Rogers ever expected Bucky Barnes - infamous ex-assassin, giver of death glares, moody best friend extraordinaire  - to read, is goddamn <i>yaoi</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rose Petals

**Author's Note:**

> Because I saw [the story prompt for International Fanworks Day](http://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/4770) and instantly pictured Bucky getting excited over gay Japanese romance. 
> 
> This was originally gonna just be fluffy silliness but then it actually matured and got some decent feels. Also, it inexplicably turned into an incredibly late Christmas fic. Enjoy!

It all starts about two months after Bucky's come back. 

They're in a small comic book store somewhere downtown. Bucky had pulled Steve into the shop by his arm, murmuring something about wanting to see if his comic book counterpart measured up to the real life guy, and Steve had acquiesced, if a little begrudgingly. After all, it'd been barely four weeks since Bucky had gotten most of his memories back - the first month had been mainly composed of blank staring at the wall, refusing meals, and screams echoing down the gleaming halls of the Avengers Tower at night, something which Steve is very happy has more or less finished.

Bucky's gotten a lot better since then, and Steve's worried about sending him back down the same road. He didn't know if Bucky would be able to handle seeing the Captain America comics, seeing the man he'd used to be etched on the glossy paper when he could barely remember it himself.

Thankfully he's been fine so far, though, apparently content to flick through the pages and make the occasional huff or exclamation of surprise. Steve's pretty sure he even sees a faint smile at one point when he comes to a double page spread of the Howling Commandos. 

Steve makes his way to the back of the store where a different comic book has caught his eye, something about zombies or an apocalypse. He flicks through it, the intricate artwork making his hands itch to draw again, and by the time he makes it back to Bucky, he's standing in front of a different shelf and staring at a brightly-coloured book held in his hands.

"Bucky? You okay?" says Steve when he doesn't move, even when Steve sidles up close next to him. 

Bucky doesn't answer, and Steve worries for a moment, glances down at the book in his hands. 

On the front cover are two guys with abnormally large eyes. They're entwined together, the larger man's arms wrapped around the smaller man, and a slew of rose petals float around their forms. The artwork is slightly unusual and it takes Steve a second to place before he remembers Tony showing him something like this a while ago, a drawing that someone had done of Captain America and Iron Man in an all too, well, _intimate,_ embrace. There was a reason Steve had removed Tony from his contacts list, after all. Well, that and the incessant puns. 

"Are those two men?" Bucky says at last, voice quiet. 

 _Oh._ Something in Bucky's voice makes Steve glance up, but Bucky doesn't look disgusted, or angry, or afraid. Just curious.

Steve nods. "Yeah. I think it's called  _yaoi,_ or something. It's a type of Japanese comic." 

"Huh." Bucky places it carefully back on the shelf. "And people can just buy it? Even with two guys like ... that, right on the front cover?"

Steve pauses. "Yeah, well ..." He scratches the back of his neck awkwardly. "People are a lot more tolerant now. Men can get married to each other and everything." 

Bucky does that quiet little "huh" again and walks out of the store, Steve following on his heels. 

Bucky doesn't mention it again the whole walk back to the tower, and neither does Steve. 

  
*

  
The next couple of months pass uneventfully; there's the occasional day that needs saving and the odd crisis here and there, but most of Steve's time is spent around the Avengers Tower exercising or reading (after all, he does have sixty-odd years of quality books to still catch up on, and he doesn't care what Tony says, physical books are not  _just_ for old people, and  _no,_ he will not get a Kindle or whatever the hell it's called, so just  _quit asking,_ _dammit_ ). 

Bucky, unsurprisingly, enjoys trying out the new technology more than Steve, and it's not long before he's adapted to using one of Stark's high-end smartphones, and carries it with him nearly everywhere he goes. There's quite a few early mornings where Steve walks into the kitchen only to see Bucky hunched over the table and swiping his good hand across the screen, reading something that Steve can't quite make out. 

On the few occasions he's tried to see what's on the screen by standing behind Bucky and attempting to sneak a glance, he's met with one of Bucky's famous death glares, or by Bucky quickly switching off the screen and silently leaving the room.

So he stops trying to see, and tries instead not to notice how Bucky almost looks happy when he's reading whatever's on his screen, how the corner of his mouth turns up just slightly, and how that makes a strange lightness rise in Steve's chest.

He figures Bucky will tell him, eventually. 

  
*

  
One night they're on opposite ends of a couch in a large room of the Avengers Tower, when Bucky laughs. 

At first Steve isn't sure he's heard correctly, and he glances over the top of his book.

Bucky's got a hand clapped over his mouth, eyes twinkling and shoulders trembling slightly with mirth as he looks at his phone, and Steve's eyes widen. 

"You okay there, Bucky?" he finally manages to say, unable to stop staring. He hasn't heard Bucky laugh since the  _forties,_ for christ's sake, and he'd forgotten how much he honest-to-god loved the sound. 

"I'm fine," says Bucky, waving a hand in Steve's direction without looking up from the phone, still smiling. "I'm great."

"That's ... good," says Steve uncertainly, and turns back to his book, trying not to make too big a deal out of it.

A few minutes later Bucky laughs again, louder, and Steve stares openly this time, putting the book down. 

"Okay, I have to know," he says. "What are you laughing at?"

"Nothing," says Bucky, "Nothing to worry about."

"Oh, that's fine," says Steve sarcastically, "I was just curious about the fact that you laughed for the first time in  _five months._ "

Bucky raises an eyebrow. "So I'm not allowed to have a sense of humour?" 

"Not what I said, Buck," says Steve, "I'm just wondering what made you cackle like the hyenas from  _The Lion King._ "

"Stark's been making you watch too many Disney movies, hasn't he?"

"Stop changing the subject."

" _Fine_ ," says Bucky, throwing up his arms in defeat. He puts down his phone and starts picking at a loose thread on his pants, and Steve senses this is more important to him than he's let on. 

"Okay," says Bucky at last, looking down at the ground, pointedly avoiding Steve's eyes. "Do you remember when we went to that comic store a while back, and I saw the comic with the, uh," he takes a deep breath, "the two guys on the front cover?" 

"Yes," says Steve slowly, not sure where this is going. "What about it?" 

"Well, I've sort of been reading it." 

Steve blinks. "What?"

"It's not like I'm god,  _gay,_ or anything," Bucky says quickly, and it pains Steve to see the guilt in his expression, "I just like reading it."

"There's nothing wrong with being gay," says Steve quietly, the words almost getting stuck in his throat, and god he shouldn't be afraid of saying things like that in this day and age but he still feels his skin prickle and his heart pound in his chest like he's sure he's gonna get attacked any second.

But it's worth it for the soft, curious expression Bucky gives him. Their eyes meet and suddenly Steve can't look away -  _were his eyes always so beautiful? -_ and the moment seems to stretch on for an eternity even though it's probably only a few seconds. 

Steve looks away with a cough when the gaze gets too intimate, when he's worried he might actually try to do something he's surehe'd regret later, though he doesn't know exactly what that is, and Bucky looks away too, picks up his phone as Steve picks up his book in silence. 

After a couple of minutes he says, "You can tell me about the uh,  _yaoi,_ if you want." The word feels unfamiliar on his tongue.

Bucky looks suspiciously at him, eyes narrowed. "Really?" 

"Of course, Bucky," he says, "We're best friends, you can tell me anything." 

Bucky nods, though his mouth is pursed for a reason Steve doesn't understand.

"Fine," he says, and then abruptly smiles, shuffling over on the couch and unlocking his phone so Steve can see the screen.

"So I've been reading this thing called  _Sekai-ichi Hatsukoi_ and it's about this guy who goes to work at a, um,  _manga,_ " he stumbles over the word slightly, "publishing company thing, and then it turns out his boss, who's this total bastard, is actually the guy he confessed his love to back in high school, and then like, there's _all these other_ plot twists, and it turns out one of the guys is engaged, and then the boss gives this guy this bet that he'll fall in love with him in six months, or something, and it's just _so great_ -"

Bucky shows Steve photos on his phone almost as quickly as he's saying all this, and it takes Steve a second to realise that these are pages from the manga he's actually saved to the camera roll, and his head feels like it's going to implode any second. He can feel a flush crawling up his neck, and it's probably reached his cheeks and already tainted them bright pink, judging from the look Bucky's giving him. 

"You alright, Steve?" he says when he pauses for breath. "This is okay, isn't it?" 

There's an unspoken question of  _am I okay for liking this?_ in Bucky's voice, and Steve smiles and nods, reaching out to punch Bucky lightly on the shoulder. He ignores how the contact makes something almost electric shiver through his body.

"Of course it's alright," he says, even though his mind is reeling. "You were saying?" 

Bucky grins, wide, and it's the first time Steve's seen him properly smile in well,  _decades._

"So the main character is this guy called Onoderaand the boss is called Takano _,_ and it's funny because they actually work for the  _yaoi_ department in the manga company, even though they're all guys, but apparently that happens quite a bit in the real world-"

Steve thinks he's never seen Bucky look quite so animated - except for back in the days of the war when they were fighting side by side  - and it's bizarre that this gay Japanese comic thing is what's brought him - the old Bucky - back.  

The thing is, Steve can understand why Bucky might want to read comic books - after all, who wouldn't want to read a story they're actually in? - and even Bucky reading Japanese comics - "manga", apparently - isn't that unusual, if a little harder for Steve to wrap his head around.

But the last thing Steve Rogers ever expected Bucky Barnes - infamous ex-assassin, giver of death glares, moody best friend extraordinaire - to read, is goddamn _yaoi_.

But he's okay with it, if it makes Bucky this happy. 

  
*

  
The next month is so surreal Steve feels like he's dreaming half the time. 

Bucky's happy a surprising amount of the time; sure, there's still nights when he wakes up screaming in Russian or some other harsh language and Steve has to pin him down, wait until his breathing slows and he stops trying to strangle him; there're still days when Bucky stares blankly at a wall for an hour or two, or sees something on the internet that makes him freeze up and stop responding to anything Steve says. 

But he smiles more often now, and almost every time he sees Steve, so long as they're alone, he'll talk excitedly about the latest  _yaoi_ he's reading, mind moving so quickly his mouth stumbles over the words, and even though some of them are pretty ridiculous - seriously, why are there rose petals in every single damn kiss scene? - Steve can't help feeling enthused by how well Bucky's doing. 

Which is why he doesn't say anything, keeps his hands clenched by his sides whenever Bucky leans too close and his long hair - he's refused to have it cut - brushes Steve's shoulder, when Bucky's smiles make Steve's heart pound like he's in the middle of a fight, when Bucky wears nothing but loose pants during his morning workouts and Steve can barely resist the urge to run his hands along the smooth planes of Bucky's chest and down the gleaming arm attached to his shoulder, down to where coarse hair leads under the waistband of his pants--

Steve starts having breakfast in his room where he can't see Bucky workout anymore.

The thing is, he's known he was bisexual ever since he knew what the word meant, though he'd never acted on his attractions, and he's accepted that part of himself completely, even though he hasn't told anyone except Natasha. And yeah, there'd been nights back in the war when he'd looked at Bucky's sleeping form next to him on the cold ground and wanted to shuffle over and huddle together in a very non-platonic way. 

But he can't do that now, not when Bucky's barely regained half his memories. So he doesn't.

He tells himself it's for the best - after all, Bucky's doing so well, and Steve doesn't want to disrupt that at all, even when sometimes he feels like he can hardly resist leaping across the couch and wrapping his arms around Bucky's smaller form. 

So he stays quiet, and Bucky talks constantly about gay relationships, and Steve tries to pretend he's not quietly dying when he sees the way Bucky looks at art of two men making out. 

 _Stupid yaoi,_ he thinks. 

  
*

  
Christmas descends on the Avengers household sooner than anyone expects, and so it's only two days before Christmas when Tony finally gets around to putting up the tree in a corner of the living room - amid much fuss and swearing - with other decorations strewn haphazardly through the rest of the tower. 

Steve helps him put up some mistletoe around the place, and right when he's reaching up to put some on a doorway near the kitchen, that's when Stark says it.

"So, are you and Bucky gonna bone anytime soon?" 

Steve hits his head on the doorway with a loud _clunk_. He turns slowly to give Tony an incredulous stare, rubbing the back of his head. _That actually hurt_. 

"What?" 

Tony smirks. "Come on Cap, you can't pretend you don't want to. I see the way you two look at each other." 

"You two?" Steve repeats, thoroughly confused. 

"Oh, please," says Tony, rolling his eyes. "You've been making googly eyes at each other since the day he came back."

Steve looks away, ignores the heat rising to his cheeks. "Bucky doesn't feel that way."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that, Cap," says Tony. "I mean, have you  _seen_ the yaoi he reads?" 

Steve stares again. "You know about the yaoi?" 

Tony looks at him pointedly. "The internet connection is _monitored_ , Steve, it's not hard for me to see what people look at online. And I can tell you," he says, walking back down the hall and gesturing for Steve to follow him, "if you'd bothered to pay attention to the things he reads, you'd see a surprising portion of them feature romances between shorter, black-haired gentlemen, and taller, blonde-haired gentlemen."

He turns to look at Steve, eyebrow raised. "Does that sound familiar to you?" 

Steve can't stop the blush rising to his cheeks. "That doesn't mean anything," he mumbles. 

"Well, he also told me he has a crush on you, so there's that." 

Steve blinks. "He what?" 

"He likes you, Cap," says Tony nonchalantly, turning away to the kitchen, "so you might as well tell him you feel the same way." 

Steve is frozen in place for a moment, hardly daring to believe.

 _Well, I guess there's nothing to lose,_ he thinks, and walks off to find Bucky, hope rising in his chest. 

  
*

  
Bucky's in his bedroom and Steve hesitates outside the doorway, palms sweaty and words suddenly caught in his throat. He takes a deep breath, feeling more scared than he has in a long time.  _You can do this,_ he says to himself, over and over.  _You can do this._

Finally, he walks slowly into the room, and Bucky's sprawled on the bed in a way that sends heat prickling down Steve's spine, metal arm resting behind his head so his singlet pulls up and reveals a sliver of milky skin.

He cocks an eyebrow as Steve sits down on the edge of his bed.

"Bucky," begins Steve, mouth dry, "I wanted to, uh, ask you something. And I don't want you to get mad, I just want to know." 

Bucky's brow furrows. "What is it?" 

Steve takes a deep breath, figures it'd be best to just get it over with. 

"Are you gay?" 

Bucky's mouth purses. "No. I like women, Steve." 

"Oh," says Steve, looking at the ground. He hears Bucky sigh. 

"But ... I like men as well." 

Steve glances up, but Bucky's staring at the wall. 

"So do I," says Steve very quietly, and that's when Bucky tilts his head slowly to look at him, something like hope flashing in his eyes. 

"Really?" he says, quiet, and Steve nods. 

"Always have, always will," he says, and Bucky grins. 

They lock gazes and all Steve can think is  _how did I never realise you were so beautiful,_ and he swears he can see the same sentiment echoed in Bucky's expression, and the next second he's halfway up the bed and Bucky's on his back, and their lips crash together awkwardly as Steve runs his hands through Bucky's long hair. 

Their mouths slot together, slow and languid, tongues touching with a thrill, as Steve lowers his weight carefully onto Bucky, pressing their bodies and hips close together, and then Bucky's grasping Steve's shoulders with strong hands and rutting upwards against Steve's jeans, moaning obscenely against his mouth, whispering in between kisses.

"--liked you from the first moment I saw you--wanted you so much--so  _goddamn_ much Steve--those fuckin' yaoi weren't close enough to the real thing--" and Steve feels like laughing and crying at the same time.

Bucky's mouth is so soft and warm and his hair is silky in Steve's hands, and his stubble rubs against Steve's cheek - he's not sure how he'll explain the rash later, but he doesn't care in the slightest.

Bucky Barnes, moody best friend extraordinaire, who somehow made it through seventy-odd years of pain and war to find his way back to Steve, is in his arms, kissing him like Steve's the only person in the world -  and that's all Steve's wanted, for a very long time. 

  
*

  
When Tony enters the kitchen, Natasha's sitting at the table, eating cereal. 

"That was an interesting conversation," she says, without looking up from the bowl.

Tony rolls his eyes, not at all surprised she'd somehow heard him talking to Steve, what with her freaky ninja-hearing and all.

"I'm glad I could entertain you," he says, grabbing an apple from the fruit bowl.

"Did Bucky really tell you he has a crush on Steve?" she says after a moment.

Tony shrugs. "No, he didn't."

He leans against the counter. "But when a man's internet search history is filled with things like 'how do I tell my best friend I have feelings for him', and 'am I a twink or a bear', it's not hard to see what's happening." 

Natasha huffs in amusement. "That would explain the mistletoe." 

Tony grins. "It would indeed, Natasha."

Suddenly, he hears the unmistakeable sound of rhythmic bed springs squeaking from upstairs. He cocks his head to the side, raising an eyebrow.

Natasha looks up at the ceiling with a faintly incredulous expression. 

"Looks like we didn't need the mistletoe after all," says Tony after a long pause, smirking.

"Looks like," she agrees, pushing the cereal bowl away. "And it looks like I've lost my appetite." 

"Merry Christmas, Natasha," he grins, and she glares at him before muttering back a reluctant "Merry Christmas", just as a strangled groan erupts from somewhere upstairs. 

"Well, I'm leaving," she says briskly, getting up and walking out of the room. "Don't expect me back for, I don't know, a few _months_." 

It's all Tony can do not to burst out laughing, but he feels oddly happy as well, glad those two idiots finally told each other how they feel.

"Merry Christmas," he finally says to no one in particular, as the rhythmic squeaking intensifies upstairs, and bites into his apple. 


End file.
